November 14, 2008

Someone asked me, "If we bail out the auto companies how do we make sure they don't just go off and build gas hogs, and give all the profits to their executives again?"

The answer to this is the answer that should have been part of the Wall Street bailout: You benefit from the Public, so the Public had better start benefiting from you. You get the money and you start building cars that are lined up with the public interest. You serve the public, not harvest the public. You limit executive compensation and spread the wealth around. You pay taxes when you do well. You don't try to influence the political process in any way because We, the People tell you what to do, not the other way around. Etc.

(Question: why aren't these the explicit rules for doing business in the U.S. anyway - bailout or not?)